scholarly journals Eurosceptics into the Limelight? Eurosceptic Parliamentary Actors and Media Bias in EU Affairs

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 248-265 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katrin Auel

In the spotlight for some time now, the potential of national parliaments to legitimise EU politics has become even more salient given the growing politicisation and public contestation of EU issues. Their ability to realise this potential depends, however, vitally on citizens being actually aware of parliamentary involvement in EU affairs. Academic as well as political attention has therefore more recently turned to the communication function of parliaments, and here the media play a crucial role. Important is not only whether EU parliamentary affairs are covered in the media, but also <em>who</em> within parliament gets the opportunity to raise European issues in the media. In the context of this thematic issue, the question of media visibility is of particular interest with regard to Eurosceptic parliamentary party groups and their members. Do Eurosceptics in parliament get to dominate parliamentary EU news in the media and thus to take ownership of EU issues—or do the media freeze parliamentary Eurosceptics out of the coverage? Both would seriously undermine the legitimising potential of national parliaments. The article therefore analyses to what extent we can find a visibility bias in the print media coverage of Eurosceptic parliamentary actors and explores the factors that contribute to such bias. For the analysis, it draws on a quantitative dataset of all newspaper articles covering parliamentary EU affairs in six member states (Austria, Finland, France, Germany, Poland and the UK) over a period of four years (2010 to 2013).

Sociology ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 53 (3) ◽  
pp. 486-502 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kate Petty ◽  
Stacey Pope

This article examines English print media coverage of the England national women’s football (soccer) team during the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup. It draws on a content analysis of five English national newspapers from 24 May to 14 August 2015. A wide body of research has demonstrated that women’s sport continues to be greatly underrepresented in the media but our findings are important as they demonstrate that during this tournament, women’s football received a significant amount of print media coverage and that this coverage was largely positive. We argue that we have entered a new age of media coverage of women’s sport in the UK, with a shift towards greater gender equality.


BMJ Open ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (9) ◽  
pp. e023485
Author(s):  
Caroline Louise Miller ◽  
Aimee Lee Brownbill ◽  
Joanne Dono ◽  
Kerry Ettridge

ObjectivesIn 2012, Australia was the first country in the world to introduce plain or standardised tobacco packaging, coupled with larger graphic health warnings. This policy was fiercely opposed by industry. Media coverage can be an influential contributor to public debate, and both public health advocates and industry sought media coverage for their positions. The aim of this study was to measure the print media coverage of Australian’s plain packaging laws, from inception to roll-out, in major Australian newspapers.MethodsThis study monitored mainstream Australian print media (17 newspapers) coverage of the plain packaging policy debate and implementation, over a 7-year period from January 2008 to December 2014. Articles (n=701) were coded for article type, opinion slant and topic(s).DesignContent analysis.ResultsCoverage of plain packaging was low during preimplementation phase (2008–2009), increasing sharply in the lead into legislative processes and diminished substantially after implementation. Articles covered policy rationale, policy progress and industry arguments. Of the news articles, 96% were neutrally framed. Of the editorials, 55% were supportive, 28% were opposing, 12% were neutral and 5% were mixed.ConclusionsProtracted political debate, reflected in the media, led to an implementation delay of plain packaging. While Australian media provided comprehensive coverage of industry arguments, news coverage was largely neutral, whereas editorials were mostly supportive or neutral of the policy. Countries seeking to implement plain packaging of tobacco should not be deterred by the volume of news coverage, but should actively promote the evidence for plain packaging in the media to counteract the arguments of the tobacco industry.


Author(s):  
Angela Krewani

In this chapter, I explore the media coverage of the Arab Spring and the reactions of Western media communities. Focusing on interactive documentaries and websites, this chapter clearly demonstrates to what extent media bring about individualized coverage to major events. Digital media especially have merged with cartographic competencies to provide topical information. Compared to the informational range of classic print media and television, these digital platforms and digitally distributed art forms create new and interactive forms of media participation.


2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 255-275
Author(s):  
Yiqin Ruan ◽  
Jing Yang ◽  
Jianbin Jin

Biotechnology, as an emerging technology, has drawn much attention from the public and elicited hot debates in countries around the world and among various stakeholders. Due to the public's limited access to front-line scientific information and scientists, as well as the difficulty of processing complex scientific knowledge, the media have become one of the most important channels for the public to get news about scientific issues such as genetically modified organisms (GMOs). According to framing theory, how the media portray GMO issues may influence audiences’ perceptions of those issues. Moreover, different countries and societies have various GMO regulations, policies and public opinion, which also affect the way media cover GMO issues. Thus, it is necessary to investigate how GMO issues are covered in different media outlets across different countries. We conducted a comparative content analysis of media coverage of GMO issues in China, the US and the UK. One mainstream news portal in each of the three countries was chosen ( People's Daily for China, The New York Times for the US, and The Guardian for the UK). We collected coverage over eight years, from 2008 to 2015, which yielded 749 pieces of news in total. We examined the sentiments expressed and the generic frames used in coverage of GMO issues. We found that the factual, human interest, conflict and regulation frames were the most common frames used on the three portals, while the sentiments expressed under those frames varied across the media outlets, indicating differences in the state of GMO development, promotion and regulation among the three countries.


2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 276-297
Author(s):  
Gregory Perreault ◽  
Newly Paul

This paper examines how religious news organizations in the UK covered the Syrian refugee crisis in Europe. Using narrative framing theory, this paper examines all coverage from 2015 and 2016 published in bbc Religion (a part of bbc News), The Muslim News, and Christian Today to examine shared and disparate narratives regarding Syrian refugees migrating to the UK. Four major frames emerged from our analysis of the media coverage in religious and mainstream publications: a humanizing frame, saviour frame, dehumanizing frame, and, redemption frame. The publications differed in their use of these frames as well as the use of sources, news values, and tone of coverage. We discuss each of these frames as well as the implications of the differing coverage.


2016 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 111-132 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jakob-Moritz Eberl ◽  
Markus Wagner ◽  
Hajo G. Boomgaarden

Media coverage can influence how citizens think about their political leaders. This study explores how three types of media bias (visibility bias, tonality bias, and agenda bias) affect voter assessments of politicians’ traits. Bias effects should be stronger for political traits (such as competence) than for nonpolitical traits (such as likability). Biases may also interact in their effects: Specifically, visibility bias should moderate the impact of tonality bias. Combining media, party, and survey data through manual content analysis of newspaper coverage ( N = 2,680) and party press releases ( N = 1,794), as well as a three-wave voter survey ( n = 927) during the 2013 Austrian election campaign, we find substantial effects of tonality bias and agenda bias on political trait perceptions. The effects are less clear for nonpolitical trait perceptions. Although visibility bias has no direct impact, there is evidence that it moderates effects of tonality bias on candidate perceptions.


2016 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 313-328 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Skorkjær Binderkrantz ◽  
Laura Chaqués Bonafont ◽  
Darren R. Halpin

This article provides the first systematic cross-country analysis of interest group appearances in the news media. The analysis included three countries – the UK, Spain and Denmark – each representing one of Hallin and Mancini’s1three overall models of media and politics: the liberal system, the polarized pluralist system and the democratic corporatist system. It finds important similarities across countries with high levels of concentration in media coverage of groups, more extensive coverage of economic groups than citizen groups, and differential patterns of group appearances across policy areas and between right- and left-leaning papers. It also identifies country variation, with the highest degree of concentration among group appearances in Spanish newspapers and the most attention to economic groups in Danish newspapers.


2003 ◽  
Vol 27 (9) ◽  
pp. 331-333 ◽  
Author(s):  
Beatrice Huang ◽  
Stefan Priebe

Aims and MethodWe aimed to assess the contents and tone of articles on mental health care in the UK print media by comparing them with reporting in the USA and Australia. Two broadsheets from each country were analysed using the Internet for a random 4 months over a 1-year period. The number of articles, their content and the views expressed in them were identified and compared.ResultsA total of 118 articles on mental health care issues were found. The predominant tone of the articles in all three countries was negative, though there were slightly more positive articles in the USA and Australian media. Positive articles highlighted in the UK media covered mostly medical conferences and research findings.Clinical ImplicationsEfforts to achieve a more positive attitude towards people with mental illnesses in the public, such as anti-stigma campaigns, operate against a background of predominantly negative coverage of mental health care issues in broadsheets. The coverage in the UK may tend to be even less positive than in the USA and Australia. Medical conferences and research findings can, however, be used to promote positive views of mental health care in the media.


2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 282-302
Author(s):  
Emel Ozdora-Aksak ◽  
Colleen Connolly-Ahern ◽  
Daniela Dimitrova

News shapes audiences’ views of people and events beyond their immediate physical environment. Since the mass migration of refugees from Syria represents one of the worst humanitarian crises in modern history, its news coverage necessarily shaped the way global audiences understood the crisis. This qualitative study employs critical discourse analysis (CDA), specifically Van Leeuwen’s Discourse and Practice: New Tools for Critical Discourse Analysis (2008) as a social practice approach, to reveal and compare the discursive strategies used in the print media coverage of the Syrian refugees in three European countries: Turkey, Bulgaria and the UK. The findings show significant differences in the discourse used to describe the refugees and different approaches in terms of contextualization, spaces and actions depicted in the media coverage in each country. The study reveals the ongoing dialogue between journalistic practice and political decision making in three countries impacted to varying extents by the ongoing crisis.


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